Exploring Relational Space

Exploring Relational Space

We spend so much of our time with people, at home, at work, with friends and so on. I am finding it to be an extremely interesting exploration to see what the difference is between the state of consciousness I am in when I conduct my relationships and to compare that to the states available when alone in nature or in meditation.

What I find true for myself historically, is that when I am in the presence of others, my mind is busier and more full of itself, analyzing the other person’s responses to me, forming opinions about them or planning how I might respond to them. So historically I would say that I lose contact with deep truth in relationship generally, entering a social modality where mind gets to define (and limit) the quality of the relationship.

In nature, in meditation, or even just alone in my room however, I have had for quite some time an ability to let mind take a back seat in my consciousness. This allows me to enjoy a blissful sense of life’s perfectness and grace, even in the midst of troubled times. Why it is harder or secondary for me to bring this kind of realization into my everyday human relationships I am not sure, but it seems to be how it has worked.

In the past few years I have been discovering that there are some very amazing relational possibilities that I have not known about before, except maybe in relationships with spiritual teachers, which of course I considered to be in a different category altogether than my relationship with my colleagues at work for instance. My education in this began one evening when a friend and I sat down in her living-room after dinner (intending a social evening) and we both inexplicably dropped into a deeper space together than I had ever experienced on my own. For me it was completely unexpected, to find myself in the deepest meditative space of my life-so-far without having meditated. To have dropped into such an unbelievably rich and nourishing place with another person and to be sitting there talking about it, marveling out loud. Another defining thing about this was that it did not feel personal at all. It wasn’t about us. It was about something far beyond the personal people who had come to it.

We were being shown something new that was possible.

This experience has continued, at first rarely but now more commonly, with new people, new explorations, meeting in person and even over the telephone. It feels as if this “relational field” is teaching us, those of us who will tune in. It also feels like we are developing a new muscle of some sort – an ability to meet each other in this deep place and let go of the reins there. In my experience so far it has been women who seem to have an easier time “dropping in” in this way for whatever reason, though I very much look forward to having these kinds of meetings with men too. I very much look forward to being able to bring this sort of relational space more and more into my daily experience too and I can feel it’s movement in that direction, though I feel to be a complete beginner.

As I get more practice in this, the habit of relating in a shallow or mind-based way to the people at work or to my family or acquaintances, stands out more and more in contrast to it. It is also obvious that there are degrees of this – that how I am relating to others is not black and white. I can feel when, in an ordinary everyday conversation there is a thread of openness to this deeper relational space between us. It does not seem to need me to know the person conventionally either. While familiarity brings trust and the feeling of safety is I’m sure helpful in creating the container for this “relational field”, it seems also able to show up in a word with a passing stranger. It looks like it is probably just my own mind’s ideas about where it is and is not safe or possible that has busily constructed limits to it.

There is a distinct feeling of importance to this, beyond that which drove me to meditate for years, but not so different from it. It seems that this next phase of development is now about who/what we collectively are, and about what we know together from the various perspectives we collectively inhabit. It seems to be all about our ability to enter an active impersonal relational space, from which we can interact with each other in new ways according to what we see happening around us and each of our roles in it.

I would love to hear about it if you are having any experiences that are similar.

The Caterpillar, the Butterfly & the World

Imagine for a moment that you are a caterpillar who is finishing up with caterpillar life. You have instinctively wrapped yourself in a cocoon. Your old life is dissolving. Nothing works anymore. It looks like chaos. It looks like the end.

Then, in your imagination, put yourself in the position of being the butterfly coming into being as the caterpillar finishes. It feels to you now like the caterpillar has recycled himself to support your new life. Caterpillar chaos and death (?) seems to be allowing room for and actually supporting your becoming something else – something quite new.

One thing we can do in these times of upheaval and turmoil in the world, is to consider this metaphor to begin to look at situations through the eyes of the butterfly. These new eyes focus not so much on the destruction of the old but see most clearly the arising of a new possibility for humankind.